Read Murder at the Villa Maria-Sedona Retirement Home Page 25

  Chapter Sixteen

  “You did good tonight, Dallas.” Noah kissed her cheek before backing out of the Fenwick driveway.

  “It didn’t feel good.” She sighed and blew air through her clenched jaws. “I wanted to take that woman’s scrawny neck between my hands and squeeze until I heard the hiss of her last breath.”

  Noah didn’t believe it for a moment, but knew Dallas felt good saying it. He laughed, knowing how she might take offense, but figuring it was worth the shot.

  “It’s not funny.” She turned away from his face but not before he caught a glimpse of a smile.

  Noah and Dallas rode through the deserted secondary roads in silence. There was nothing to see in the blackness of the night except the area of asphalt directly ahead of them illuminated in the truck’s high beams.

  Ten minutes into the twenty-minute ride back to Dallas’s garden home, Noah broke the moratorium.

  “Calliope’s a pistol, huh?”

  She snorted. “I guess. I’m disappointed I didn’t get to meet Maya and Kira.”

  “It’s only to be expected when having a soirée ―” She silenced him with a rigid finger and a stony look.

  “Please, no more soirée jokes.”

  Noah sobered. “There’ll be other opportunities, Dallas.” In his mind, he fast-forwarded the evening. “We all hit it off pretty good.” With the exception of the Trojan horse, of course. No one could warm to that woman, he was certain, and that wasn’t something he would tell Dallas. Ever.

  “Uh-huh. We did. Abbott’s a really great guy.”

  He nodded and wished he could take away her pain or turn back the clock, rework history. Dallas’s biological mother was a bona fide snob. Perhaps she’d earned the title or came upon it naturally, he couldn’t be sure. She attended the festivity, yet she’d turned down her nose at everyone, everyone that was with the exception of the good judge. It even seemed she had something against her daughter, the one she kept, as Dallas liked to point out, as though he’d forgotten. Not a chance of that happening. The thought of Alexandra as his mother-in-law made him raise his brows and brought on a grimace. Trojan horse. The term suited the woman well.

  “I’m glad you decided not to confront Alexandra tonight,” he said, turning his eyes away from the road for a moment to look at her.

  “Harrumph.”

  Silence fell on them once again.

  Normally, Noah never minded, but in this case, where there was so much that needed discussing, the quiet bothered him. “Have you given any thought to whether you’ll continue to keep the secret?”

  Dallas spotted the white-tailed deer running from the woods at the same time as he.

  “Careful there, hon.” She set her feet flat on the floor and pushed on an imaginary brake.

  “I see him.” Noah slowed and passed the animal without incident, remembering she hadn’t answered his question. Purposeful, he wondered. “Have you?”

  She let out a long sigh. “It’s all I thought about all night . On the one hand, I want to pretend like I don’t know the truth, but on the other…” she groaned, “on the other, I’m curious to know all the answers. And a little scared, too.”

  He took her hand and gave it a squeeze. “Whatever you decide, I’ll be behind you one hundred per cent.”

  She smiled. “I know.”

  Noah could understand why she would be frightened. Some questions were better left unasked. Some things were better left unknown.

  Land fog roamed along the road, and Noah likened the mist with how Dallas must be feeling at the moment ― there yet intangible.

  “Lily’s father seems ― ” His cell phone rang. He checked call display. “It’s Max. I should take it.”

  “Go ahead.” She took her hand away from the side of her face and leaned her head back against the headrest.

  “Max, I hope you’ve got good news for me,” Noah said and brought the truck to a stop on the shoulder of the road.

  “Sorry to call you so late, but I figured you’d want to know ASAP. As far as the good news goes, it depends on what way you look at it and from what side. Both your vics were dead at the time The Crucifix Killer struck. They died from natural causes, son. Did you want the medical terms?”

  “Naw. I’ll wait for the autopsy reports. You’ll get those to me soon?”

  “In the morning by email. The written report will take considerably longer.”

  Noah nodded. “The steno strike.”

  Max signed off and Noah closed his phone and cursed. He noticed Dallas looking at him expectantly. “It seems my vics, the judge and the lawyer, died of natural causes.”

  “God.” She bit the inside of her lip. “But it shouldn’t surprise you. You supposed as much.”

  True, he had. “It’s something else to know for fact, though.” He ran his fingers through his hair and cursed again. “What are the odds? It might be unprecedented.”

  “Corpses have been defaced before, been killed after they’re already dead, too.”

  Murderers killing a body, thinking they took a life. He couldn’t recall, though, a serial killer killing his already dead victims. “But in the exact manner?” He watched her cogitate. After a moment, she looked at him.

  “I see what you mean. That probably shortens the list.”

  He would think so.

  She tucked a leg under her. “If these are vendetta killings like you suspect, the killer’s going to be upset when he finds out he didn’t actually kill his targets. Did Max say how long they were dead when they were killed again?”

  That sounded strange to his ears. “He didn’t say, and I didn’t ask. I was blown away by the news. It’ll be in his reports, I’m sure.”

  “Did Max say whether fright killed them?”

  “I don’t know if he could pinpoint it precisely.”

  “True. Probably the only one who knows for sure is the killer.”

  “When I catch him, it’ll be the first question I ask him.”